Masquerade
by animelover94
Summary: Amu attends a masked ball with her friends and meets a boy and has a really enjoyable night with him. When school starts, the same boy transfers into her class, but is totally different from when she met him! Which side is Amu going to believe?
1. Wishes

Author's notes:

This is my first fanfic! forgive me if it's too long or descriptive or something, I'm just used to writing like that :)

In my story, all my favorite couples are together! AmuxIkuto, RimaxNagihiko and KukaixUtau!!

All the things in "" are things being said. The things in '' are things being thought. Enjoy!

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A pink haired girl is sitting down on a chair as two girls are intently applying make-up on her and fixing her hair. The girl doesn't seem that excited about all this and just sits there with a concerned expression. 'Uhhh… they better not be making me look weird…' she thought.

"Oi! Chotto! Rima! Yaya!" protested the girl as she began getting uncomfortable.

"Hold still Amu-chi! You're gonna make us mess up!" complained Yaya.

"Yeah, Amu. Just sit still a bit longer, we're almost done." Rima calmly added.

"Fuuu… alright, alright…" replied Amu. 'I hope all this time sitting here and acting like a little Barbie doll will be worth it. As annoying as this is, it's actually pretty fun.' Amu smiled to herself.

"Was that a smile just now Amu?" asked Rima.

"Huu… Looks like you're enjoying this after all." grinned Yaya.

"A-as if!" replied Amu defensively.

"That's just like you, Amu-chiii..." said Yaya. "Always keeping your cool character."

Amu didn't reply to that. She just turned her cheek away from Yaya. Rima and Yaya laughed a bit at this.

"We're just about done Amu," said Rima as Amu began to get restless.

"Yup! Just… a few… finishing… touches–" Yaya said as she fixed Amu's hair a bit more. "And, done!!"

"Finally! You guys took forever! Now let me see myself…" She said as she stood up. Amu walked over to a full-length mirror that stood on the opposite wall. She took a breath and then looked at her reflection.

"Sooo… what do you think, Amu?" asked Rima.

"…"

"Amu-chi?" asked a concerned Yaya.

"I-Is that…" began Amu. "really… me?" Yaya made a relieved sigh, smiled and looked at Rima, who was smiling as well.

"Wow…" Amu said as she touched the reflection. 'I really like this dress they chose. It's a beautiful color and it feels so soft' she thought as she ran her fingers through her red dress. 'And, my hair… I would've never thought of styling it like this… It's really pretty…' she continued as she admired her loose curls. 'Everything… it just comes together perfectly. All the colors just seem to blend. Nothing looks out of place at all. All the accessories just add to the overall look. They even did my make-up well, though it's only light. They somehow made me look like I'm shining a bit.' She smiled brighter and brighter at each thought.

"See! We told you Amu-chi! We said we were going to make you look really pretty but you didn't believe us!" said Yaya in her childish I-told-you-so voice.

"Hahaha, gomen. I really wasn't sure about you two. You two didn't exactly seem like experts in this area, no offense." Amu laughed brightly.

"Well, come on now otherwise we'll be late for the ball." said Rima.

"Yeah that's right guys! Come on!" Amu said excitedly as she headed for the door.

"Hey Amu-chi! Don't forget your mask!" shouted Yaya as she held up Amu's mask.

"Oh that's right! It's a masked ball isn't it?" Amu said.

"Yeah, that's right," said Rima in reply. "Well come on now, we've wasted enough time. Utau's even here already."

"Utau ga? But I thought she was going straight there since she's going to perform." Amu said, confused.

"Well, I had to make sure that you idiots weren't going to go off doing whatever or get into some freak accident and miss my performance. Knowing you guys, there'd probably be a 75% chance of that happening if I didn't come to pick you guys up." said a girl with golden hair as she entered the room.

"Utau!" exclaimed Amu happily.

"Well come on then…" Utau said as she smiled at them. " I don't want you guys to make me late for my performance."

" And now here's Utau showing her character!" said Yaya. Utau simply blushed slightly after she said this.

"Amu-chi! Rima-tan!" Yaya said as she grabbed one of their hands as she said their name. ''Let's goooo!!" she screamed happily as she ran off towards the car dragging Amu and Rima along. "Chotto! Yayaaaaa!!" Amu exclaimed as she began flying while Yaya held her. Yaya then threw them both into the car and then hopped in herself while Utau followed her.

"Yaya…." Began Amu as she glared at her.

"Ehehehe… eto… ano…" said Yaya. "Ouch!!" she shouted as Amu hit her in the head really hard.

"Mataku…" muttered Amu. 'Well, that was a rough start, but I know that the ball is going to be fun. I can't believe Tsukasa-san invited us! It was really nice of him. But I wonder why he decided on a masked ball…'

-flashback-

Tsukasa handed Amu a white enveloped. 'Hmmm?' thought Amu.

"It's an invitation… to a masked ball?" said Amu surprised.

"Yep, a masked ball that will take place during the summer, close to the start of the next term." He said smiling. "Why a MASKED ball, you must be thinking…" he said as if reading her mind. "Well, isn't it funner to have a mask on during a party like this? With a mask, you don't have to worry about keeping up appearances with people you don't know. You can just be yourself and no one can judge you. Everyone can have fun that way…"

-end of flashback-

'Oh yeah, that's right.' she remembered. 'It's just like Tsukasa-san to think of something like that. It is true though. No need to keep my character tonight. Maybe something good will happen.'

"We're here!" Yaya said excitedly. The car began to pull up in front of the building where there seemed to be two boys standing at the spot.

"Looks like the guys were waiting for us," said Yaya. Rima and Utau began to blush slightly. The car came to a full stop and the girls began to get out of the car.

"Yo!" said one of the boys energetically, while the other simply smiled at them.

"Kukai! Nagihiko!" Amu said happily.

"Osashiburi, Amu." said Kukai smiling.

"I told you they were fine Kukai." Nagihiko told him.

"Nagihiko…" Rima said as they smiled at each other.

"Come on guys! Let's go inside! I don't want to watch you guys stare at each other all night!" said Yaya childishly. Nagihiko and Rima looked away and blushed.

"Hehe, sounds good." said Kukai. "Shall we Utau?"

"Yeah, let's go" she replied. She took his arm and they began walking towards the door of the building, Yaya not that far behind them.

"Why don't we follow them Rima?" Nagihiko asked her.

"Of course," Rima said in reply. He then took her hand and they began following the other three.

'Hmmm… that must be nice. To have someone special… I'm the only one in the group who doesn't have anyone, seeing how Yaya doesn't count, acting like all of our little sister.' Amu sighs. 'I wish I could have someone like they do… Maybe something good might come out of this ball.' Amu thought hopefully. She put on her mask and followed everyone else inside.

"Sugoi!" she exclaimed when she entered the room. 'It all looks so amazing! Just the size of this room is amazing, but then all the people and decorations make it look even more amazing! Tsukasa-san really went all out! That is the kind of person he is after all, one who goes all out for the joy of others.'

"Amu-chiii!" yelled Yaya. "Over here!" she said signaling to Amu. Amu turned to the direction of Yaya's voice and joined the rest of their group.

"Isn't this room just dazzling?" Nagihiko asked Amu.

"Absolutely!" she replied. "It's all just so… sugoi! There's just no other word!" Everyone smiled at her as she continued to look around the room.

"Thank you everybody for coming tonight!" boomed a voice from the sound system.

"Tsukasa-san!" Amu shouted when she turned to the stage.

"It is my pleasure to welcome you all here to this ball, which will be the last big event of our town for this summer!" Tsukasa continued. "Do not fear though, minna! Though you may think everything is now coming to an end, I'd like you to know that it is not! This is really a time for beginnings: the beginning of a new term at school; the beginning of new friendships; the beginning of change, the beginning of a new chapter in some of our lives. For my nephew, this is all going to be a big change, for he will be staying with me for a while. I hope you all make him feel welcome here tonight! I'm sure you'll all see him wandering around, so please be kind to him! That's all from me for now so thank you and a good night to all of you! I'm going to turn you over now to our first performer, the rising star of Seiyo, Hoshina Utau!!"

Tsukasa then left the stage as Utau began walking to the microphone. Excitement and applause broke out through the crowd as they all saw Utau, for she is starting to become a well-known teenage singer. "Thank you, everyone!" Utau said. "Thank you all for helping me come this far! I'd like to sing this song to all of you and I'd like to dedicate it to my close friends here tonight." She said looking in the direction of Amu and the others. The music then began to play and Utau started singing.

_midori kagayaku machi_

_hibiki au warai koe_

"Wow… her voice is beautiful, as always." Amu said and smiled.

"Yeah. Isn't just beautiful?" Kukai said as he watched Utau singing.

Amu then looked at Rima and Nagihiko as they, too, watched Utau singing as they held hands. 'Now I'm jealous.' Amu thought. 'It's not in a 'mad' way though. It's in a 'hopeful' sort of way. What they have… it's so nice, so beautiful to look at. It's hard to believe that Rima and Nagihiko used to fight a lot, looking at them now. Kukai and Utau always had a good friendship with a lot of friendly competitions; it wasn't that hard to see this coming. I wonder if… I'm meant for something like them.' Amu thought curiously. 'Well, who knows, right?' Amu sighed.

… _subarashii chikyuu~_

Utau then finished her song and came down from the stage.

"That was great as always, Utau." Kukai said as she came down. She put her arms around him, which surprised Kukai. "O-oi," he said as he blushed a little. He then smiled and hugged her back and then they broke apart. Both came out of it looking quite happy.

"Hey Utau!" Kukai exclaimed as an idea came into his head. "Want to see who can eat the most from the food table fastest?"

"He, no problem," she replied with an I'm-going-to-win look on her face.

"Ike zo~!!" said Kukai as he sprinted to the food table with Utau, knocking every one out of the way as they passed.

"I want some food too~!!" Yaya cried as she chased after them.

"There they go…" Amu said as she stared after them with Nagihiko and Rima.

"H-hey Nagihiko…" Rima stuttered nervously. "W-why don't we go and dance while they're eating?"

Nagihiko was taken by surprise, for it was rare for Rima to be the one to offer, but he accepted her invitation. She took his hand and followed him to where everyone else was dancing.

"Heeee~" Amu sighed. 'Now I'm all alone. It just doesn't seem to be my night.' As she thought this, a masked boy with semi-long blue hair came up behind her. He tapped her on the shoulder and she turned to face him.

"Would you like to dance?" he offered as he held his hand out to her. Amu was pleasantly surprised and thought 'Could it be him?' She then closed her open mouth, blushing slightly, and accepted his offer. She took his outstretched hand and followed him in to the crowd of masked dancers.

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afternotes:

I hope you enjoyed my first chapter!

For people who watch the anime, you probably noticed that I kept their mannerisms and behaviour, especially Yaya's, so I hope that was okay! Please, please review so I know if I'm doing things right or not, good or bad, reviews are highly appreciated!

By the way, the song Utau sang is called "Bokutachi no Chikyuu." Amu sang the song with her classmates in episode 45 of Shugo Chara. :D

Thank you to people who reviewed for pointing out that I put he has black hair instead of blue hair :P I fixed it and put blue :)


	2. First Meeting

Author's Notes:

This is the second chapter of my fanfic! I hope you guys enjoy it. Again, "things being said", 'things being thought.' Same as the first chapter :)

I'm not that good with romance stuff so I hope it's fine. AMUTO!! XD XD

Oh yeah! In case you don't know, which you probably do, 'doki' is the sfx for heart beat in Japan. Even if you didn't know you could probably tell from the context. Anyways, enjoy!

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Amu's heart started to beat quicker and quicker as the boy continued leading the way, holding her hand.

*Doki* *Doki*

'Ugh!! Heart, stop beating so fast! I bet he can feel it through my hand.' She thought worriedly.

*Doki* *Doki* *Doki*

'Who is this boy anyway? He's so mysterious. I don't think I've seen him around before'

*Doki* *Doki*

'Wow, there are a lot of people here. Uhhh, I hope Yaya and Rima don't see me, they wouldn't stop asking me things…'

The boy then stopped as Amu was still thinking, causing her to bump into him. He caught her before she could fall on the floor. Amu blushed.

*Doki* *Doki*

'That was so embarrassing!!!' Amu thought, worried again. The boy then started to chuckle a bit, making Amu worry even more.

"Ahaha… Gomen, gomen… it's just that your expression was so funny." He said amused. Amu blushed, once again.

*Doki* *Doki* *Doki*

'Not again…'

"Don't be so nervous," he chuckled again. "I'm not gonna bite." He smiled.

"Gomen, haha," Amu laughed nervously. "I'm just not used to this."

The boy smiled and said, "Well this shouldn't be different from being with your friends right? Well then, may I have this dance?" He then made a little bow.

"Okay," she said smiling a bit nervously. She then made a little curtsy to his bow, blushing again.

"I haven't really danced before, so sorry if I'm kinda clumsy…" She said shyly.

"That's okay, I've done this a lot so you can just follow me, okay?" He then took her hand and helped her place her other one on his shoulder, since she seemed unsure of what to do. He then laughed a bit and took the lead dancing.

'Now that I can see him up close, he's really good-looking, even though he has a mask on. His hair looks so smooth and silky, and it's such a nice blue.'

*Doki* *Doki*

'And his eyes… It seems like a dark blue and black sort of combination. They're such a lovely color. It feels almost like they're drawing me in.'

The boy smiled at her. He seemed to notice at her staring at him a bit. "Now you're making me uncomfortable, hahaha."

"Oh, Gomen! I didn't mean to stare…" she laughed. He then smiled back at her.

*Doki* *Doki*

'What a nice smile…' she thought, causing her to smile too.

"You're smiling, does that mean you're enjoying yourself?"

"O-oh, u-um, yeah," she said flustered.

"Do you want to try to spin?" he asked.

"Well, I'm not so sure…" she said.

"Don't worry, I'm an expert, remember? Just follow me," he winked.

*Doki* *Doki*

"Ahaha, all right then."

He then guided her as he lifted his arm up and allowed her to spin under. Amu stumbled a bit but stayed up smiling.

"That was fun!" she said with a huge smile.

"I'm glad you're having fun. Want to try another one?"

"Yeah!" she said excitedly.

They continued dancing, occasionally laughing at each other, until they got a bit tired.

"Time to stop?" the boy asked.

"Yes, time to stop." She said a little out of breath.

"I didn't know dancing was this tiring…" she said as they were walking out of the crowd of dancers.

"Well you get used to it after a while," he laughed.

They then got out of the crowd of dancers, both laughing a bit.

"So do you want some food? You must be hungry now, especially after all that dancing." The boy offered.

"Oh, sure. Thanks so much! You're such a gentleman…" she said teasingly.

"Would you rather I wasn't?" he said amused. They both laughed and then the boy left for the food table.

'He's really nice… I'm glad he asked me to dance. I'm having so much fun!'

"AAAmmuuu-chii" slowly said a creepy voice.

"Ahhh!! Who's that?!?!" she screamed.

"Chichichichichi" the voice laughed.

"Yaya!!" she exclaimed madly. She then hit Yaya on the head.

"Don't scare me like that!" Amu said madly.

"Ouch, that hurt Amu-chi" Yaya said with a little tear. Amu turned away from Yaya with a 'Hmph!'

"So, who's that mysterious boy you were with?" Yaya said teasingly.

'I knew this was gonna happen' she sighed.

"Yeah, who is he?"

"Ah! Rima?!" Amu screamed startled. "Will you guys stop doing that?!"

"Answer the question!" Yaya said impatiently.

"Well he's… Eto… Ano…" she said not knowing what to say.

'Crap! He's coming back!' she thought as she saw him heading her way. 'What do I do with these two? They're definitely not gonna leave me alone if I ask them to!' She then looked left and right frantically, then grabbed them both and threw them towards the direction of the boys.

"Kukai!! Catch!" Amu yelled after throwing the two his way.

"Huh?" Kukai looked around to find Yaya and Rima flying in his direction.

"Amuu-chiiiiiiii!!!!" Yaya cried loudly as she was flying through the air.

"Shit! I can't catch them now!" Kukai said frantically waving his arms in the air. Then, they both landed right on top of him.

"T-that – was – a nice – throw…" Kukai couldn't help saying before he passed out."

"Here you go…" the boy said giving her the food he got.

"Oh thanks, ehehehehehe…" she said.

"Did something happen just now?" he asked curiously.

"Oh, no! Nothing at all! I just got rid of two bugs hehehe…" she laughed nervously as she saw Utau and Nagihiko looking at the knocked out pile of Kukai, Yaya and Rima.

"Oh, that's good… Do you want to go out to the balcony? I'm sure you'll have an easier time eating on the ledge rather than standing up and it'll be easier for us to talk too." he said.

"Oh sure, ehehehe" she said her mind still on the 3 unconscious people lying a few feet away from them. She then followed him to the balcony mouthing a sorry to Kukai.

They arrived at the balcony and Amu ran to the ledge.

"Uwa!! It's so pretty here! The view is so nice! The sky looks pretty too…" she said looking up at the night sky.

"The moon looks so beautiful and the stars are sparkling so nicely!" She said smiling as she observed the beautiful sky.

"You seem to be sparkling with the stars too," the boy said, smiling at Amu's enjoyment of the view. She blushed once again.

*Doki* *Doki*

Amu decided to eat as she was blushing.

"Eh~! Oishi!" she exclaimed.

"Tsukasa-san's food is good isn't it?"

"Yeah it is! I wish I could have food this delicious everyday! W-wait! I'm not saying my mom's food isn't delicious or anything… Ah… Ah…" then she decided to be quiet and eat.

The boy then started laughing pretty hard. When he began to settle down he said, "Your…Your expressions are just so funny! Ahahahaha… I love personalites like yours, hahaha. You're just so amusing!" Amu then started to blush harder than before.

*Doki* *Doki* *Doki*

'H-he said 'love', but that doesn't mean anything! Does it? Wait why am I even thinking about this?! I'm so weird! Ok, ok… just calm down Amu…'

"H-hey, um, where are you from? You don't seem like you're from around here…" she said trying to distract her thoughts.

"I just came from Europe actually," he said.

"Europe?!" she said in surprise. "Why were you there?"

"Well, I've been living there with my parents since I was a kid actually. I come here to Seiyo. Though every once in a while to visit Tsukasa-san."

"Huh? Tsukasa-san? How come?"

"Well, I'm his nephew."

"Y-you?! Oh! So you're the one he was talking about earlier! Are you here for a visit then?"

"No, I'm not." he said. "I'm gonna be here for a while…"

"Oh really? Why?"

"…"

"I-it's okay if you don't want to talk about it!! I-I'm just curious, so I couldn't help asking, ehehe…"

"My parents died."

"!!"

Amu was just in complete shock. She wasn't even sure what to say, but she tried to say something.

"I-I'm – sorry – for you're loss…" she said, not knowing what else to say.

"Oh, I'm sorry for suddenly springing that on you. It just came out. Don't be all sad now…" he said sounding concerned.

'His parent's died… at that age? I couldn't even imagine losing my parents or my sister.' She thought.

"It must be tough for you…" she said.

"I'm starting to get used to it. I'm still in shock myself, but I'm getting through… mostly because of Tsukasa-san actually."

"Tsukasa-san?" she said curiously.

"Well, he's a great man. He's been helping me out a lot. He's given me a place to stay and a lot of things to help me get by. He's helped me get out of a lot of trouble too…" he said. "but not all of it," he added really softly.

"What was the last thing you said?" Amu asked, not hearing the boy's words.

"O-oh, it's nothing…" he said in reply.

'What did he say just now? He sounded sad yet a bit resentful…'

"Oh yeah! I forgot! What's you're name? I can't believe you shared so much with me and I don't even know who you are, ahahaha…" Amu said.

"I'm Amu!" she said smiling warmly.

"I'm Ikuto, yoroshiku." The boy introduced himself.

"So, Amu, what about you?" Ikuto asked.

"Oh, huh?" she said blushing at him calling her by her name.

"Why don't you tell me a bit about yourself?"

"Well, I moved to Seiyo when I was in the 4th grade. I didn't really make any friends at first but then, Kukai, Yaya and Nagihiko all came up to me and welcomed me to the school. I was really happy. They're all so nice and friendly, but it can be a bit hard to keep up with Yaya and Kukai. They're so hyper and energetic all the time. Nagihiko's more laid back and calm, it was really easy to talk to him. Then in 5th grade, Rima moved to the school. We all tried to be friends with her, but she wasn't very friendly at first. She opened up a bit as the first two weeks of school went by. I got to be friends with her first. I sort of brought her in to our little group. She was always attached to me at first, even though she was friends with everyone else, but she grew out of it after a while, I think. The next year, Utau moved to the school. She was the hardest to befriend. She was pretty stuck-up and snobby at first, thinking she was better than everyone else, but some stuff happened between the two of us and we became friends. I got her to talk to the rest of our group too. I think she really hit it off with Kukai though. They got together last year in the 7th grade. Rima and Nagihiko did too a bit after them."

"You sound a bit jealous," Ikuto said teasingly.

"I kinda am actually… It must be nice… to find your soulmate." Amu said looking up at the sky.

"Yeah, it must be…" he said while looking at her. He then joined her in looking at the beautiful night sky.

"Oh no…" Ikuto said after looking at his watch.

"Huh? What's wrong?"

"It's getting late, I have to go… I still have to –– settle some things since I just got here."

"Oh, alright then…" Amu said.

"Why do you sound sad?" Ikuto asked.

"Well, it's just that I had a really nice time with you. This was probably the most fun I had all summer." Amu said.

Ikuto's looked surprised for a while and said, "I'm glad you think that. I had a really nice time too." Sounding like he truly meant what he said.

*Doki* *Doki*

'There's that smile again…' Amu thought as he began to smile.

"Well, again, I have to go. Good night, Amu."

"Good night, Ikuto… Why don't I introduce you to all of my friends next time we meet? We'll have even more fun!" she said.

"That does sound like fun… I'll be looking forward to it!" he said before he left her on the balcony.

Amu found everyone else and spent the rest of the ball with them. Kukai, Yaya and Rima were still mad at her for what she did. She tried to explain why she did it as best as she could. Yaya, Rima and Utau got really interested in that conversation.

"Ohoho~! So Amu-chi did meet a boy… chichichi" Yaya giggled mischievously.

"Must've been an interesting boy to put up with Amu's personality." Utau said.

"I want to meet that boy. We have to approve of him, right guys?" Rima said, sounding jealous.

Kukai and Nagihiko just said nothing while the girls had their girl talk. They seemed pretty amused with the conversations, though. They'd join in occasionally, when the girls would allow it, but they stayed out of it the rest of the time, even on the way back home.

After the ball, nothing exciting happened. They just spent a lot of time together until school started. When school started again, it was the same old routine.

"Amu, you look really tired," said Utau with Kukai beside her.

"I hardly slept… I forgot about the summer homework and had to do it all…"

"I know what you need! You need some exercise! Let's do some of 'Kukai's special training!!!'" Kukai said.

"Please no…." Amu said as tears comically streamed down her face.

"Kukai, we should probably leave her alone…" Utau said as she brought Kukai away from Amu.

"Everyone please go to your seats!" said the teacher as he entered the classroom. Everyone immediately returned to their seats and became quiet.

'I wish Yaya was my classmate… She would be able to perk me right up. Or Nagihiko too! He'd know how to help me! But I only have Utau and Kukai this year. They're okay, but Kukai… he's too much for me to handle. I like his energetic-ness once in a while, though.'

"Miss Hinamori!" the teacher said calling her attention. "If you're quite done daydreaming, I'd like to welcome our transfer student."

"H-hai…" she said. 'I miss Nikaidou-sensei! High school's gonna be so tough!'

"Mr. Tsukiyomi, please come in," the teacher said. A boy with semi-long blue hair walked in the room and stood in front of the class.

"I'm Tsukiyomi Ikuto, yoroshiku." He said sounding rather tired and bored.

"Mr. Tsukiyomi… you can sit in front of Ms. Hinamori…" said the teacher.

"Thank you sensei," he said as he walked to his chair. Amu then decided to look at the new transfer student. 'He'll be sitting in front of me the rest of the year anyways…' She looked up and caught the boy's eye just as he got to his seat.

'I-I-I-Ikuto?!' She thought as she recognized the boy. 'It's him for sure! Even if I didn't hear his name*, I know it's him! I'd recognize those eyes anywhere!' Ikuto sat down looking surprised as well.

"Ikuto!" Amu whispered trying to talk to him. Ikuto turned around to respond to Amu's call.

"I didn't know we were the same year! You look older than me! You didn't tell me you were going to the school here either! But then again, being the nephew of our headmaster, should've been obvious, huh? Well, let's survive this together!" Amu said being friendly.

"I think I'll be able to survive just fine, I'm probably smarter than you anyways. And I think I look just right for my age, thank you. You're the one that looks like a little elementary school kid. That's probably why you're so flat-chested, too" he said icily.

"Heh?" Amu said.

"Ms. Hinamori! Stop trying to get the transfer student in trouble and please pay attention!" the teacher said calling her attention.

'Smarter than me? Little elementary school kid? FLAT-CHESTED?!' she thought, still in a daze after what Ikuto said.

"I-Ikuto… what happened?" she whispered to him, trying to avoid getting called again.

"Stop talking to me, ugly flat-chested girl." He replied simply.

'FLAT-CHESTED?! UGLY?! That's it! I'm officially gonna kill him!' she thought looking at him really angrily.

"Hey," Kukai said trying to catch Utau's attention.

"What's wrong with Amu?" Kukai asked after seeing Amu making gestures at the transfer student.

"I think she wants to kill the transfer student…" she said curiously.

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*Amu was't paying attention at the time

I sorta made Ikuto like Natsume from Gakuen Alice here, so sorry if I'm copying him! It just seemed fitting.

I also hope some things don't sound forced, especially the part when she threw Yaya and Rima :)) I just made it up as I went along haha, so sorry if it sounds forced!

If you have questions, feel free to ask!

REVIEW please!! Thank you!!

I also fixed the black hair to blue here! Thanks to people for pointing it out!


	3. Appearances

Author's notes:

This chapter is in Ikuto's POV this time. It starts when Ikuto and Amu part at the ball, enjoy!

BTW! sorry i posted it kinda late. I wanted to post it since 2 days ago but I couldn't. There was sumthing wrong with the server, I think. Anyways, enjoy!

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"Good night, Ikuto… Why don't I introduce you to all of my friends next time we meet? We'll have even more fun!" Amu said.

"That does sound like fun… I'll be looking forward to it!" Ikuto said before he left her on the balcony.

'I really am looking forward to it' he smiled to himself as he left the balcony.

Ikuto walked through the party searching for Tsukasa. After a few minutes, he found him talking with some rich looking women.

"Tsukasa-san, it's time now, isn't it?" he interrupted.

"Oh yeah, just about," Tsukasa said looking at his watch.

"I'm sorry to interrupt your conversation. Tsukasa-san and I need to meet with someone now," he said to the ladies apologetically.

"O-oh… It's… no problem at all…" one of the ladies said blushing at Ikuto's good looks.

"So, Tsukasa-san… What did they call the meeting for? I thought we settled it all…" Ikuto said bitterly once out of the ladies' earshot.

"Uh, yeah… I'm not quite sure myself, but we have to meet with them despite that, right?" Tsukasa replied as they headed to the exit of the building.

They walked the remainder of the way in silence until they reached the door. They immediately got inside the black car that waited for them at the entrance.

"To the Easter building please…" Tsukasa said to the driver.

'Ugh, Easter… They just ruin everything in my life. First they cause my mother's death to get my father to behave, claiming it was a 'simple accident.' Then they intentionally got my father killed on his last mission, thinking they had no more use for him. Now I'm under their control, seeing how our whole family's being chained to them.' He thought bitterly.

"We're here Ikuto…" Tsukasa said interrupting his thoughts.

They both got out of the car and walked to the entrance of the building. Once inside, two men escorted them to a room on the top floor. It seemed to be the room of the director. The men then knocked on the door of the room.

"Yes?" said a voice from inside the room.

"We have Amakawa Tsukasa and the Tsukiyomi boy here…" said one of the men.

"Ah, it seems my awaited guests have arrived… Send them in," said the voice.

The door opened and Tsukasa and Ikuto walked inside the room.

'Ugh, this place gives me the creeps. It's always dark in here even when it's night. It smells like tobacco too. Man this guy must smoke a lot.' Ikuto looked around a bit more as they walked towards a man sitting on a chair. 'It feels like a dungeon in here… I can't see any way to leave besides the door… that could be a problem in the future…'

"Please, sit." The man in the chair offered as they reached him. They both sat down and stayed silent.

"I'm sure you're both wondering why I called you here, though we spoke just a few days ago…" said the man.

"Yes, we are. What's this about, Kazuomi?" Tsukasa asked the man.

"Well, I found Ikuto's first job working for Easter." Kazuomi replied.

'My first job…?' Ikuto thought.

"I thought that we agreed that Ikuto wouldn't be doing that kind of work…" Tsukasa said.

"Well, we did say that he wouldn't do any jobs he didn't feel comfortable doing, but I think that he will find he has no choice…" Kazuomi said mischievously.

'I'll find I have no choice? I don't like where this is going…' Ikuto thought with some concern.

"We will need Ikuto to get close to this boy, Hotori Tadase. His family is a bit… in debt to us and I don't think they'll think twice about giving to us what is ours if their boy were to be held hostage…" Kazuomi said plainly.

"!!" was the reaction of both Tsukasa and Ikuto.

"There's no way I will do that! No matter what you pull, I will not kidnap an innocent boy!" shouted Ikuto angrily.

The man just laughed.

"I would like to speak to Ikuto alone if you don't mind, Tsukasa." smiled Kazuomi evilly.

"Well I DO mind and I will not leave Ikuto alone!" was Tsukasa's answer.

Kazuomi frowned and said, "Tsukasa, I agreed to your terms thus far, but if you do not let me speak with Ikuto, I will not have any hesitation in canceling our agreements."

"!"

"Urgh… fine… but if you hurt Ikuto, I will not hesitate to return the favor…" and Tsukasa stood up angrily and walked out of the room.

At the sound of the door closing, Kazuomi said, "Ikuto please sit down." for Ikuto had stood up when he shouted.

Ikuto sat down and glared at Kazuomi.

"I understand that you came from a party just now, am I correct?"

Ikuto remained silent and continued to glare.

"Well, my men were watching you, though you didn't notice, obviously from your reaction just now." Kazuomi said in reply to Ikuto's momentary shocked expression.

'T-they were watching me? I didn't even do anything… but…!'

"That girl you were with, she's very pretty isn't she? Amu was it?" Kazuomi smiled.

Ikuto's insides were suddenly on fire. He felt really really mad and worried at the same time.

"It would be such a pity… if anything were to happen to such a nice girl, wouldn't it?"

Ikuto reacted instantly. "If you even lay a finger on her," he began to say.

"Ooo, quite irritable aren't we?" Kazuomi said interrupting him. "It seems quite obvious that you like this girl, don't you? If you don't want anything to happen to her, then you better do this job. It wouldn't be hard for us to track her down if you were to disobey us."

Ikuto stayed silent.

"Do we have a deal then?" Kazuomi asked him.

"…Alright then, fine. I'll do what you say for now, but don't you dare harm Amu." Ikuto said stressing each of the last three words.

"Hehehe, as long as you obey, I won't lay a finger on her." Kazuomi promised.

"So what am I to do now?" Ikuto asked him.

"Well first we must ask Tsukasa back in to make your arrangements." Kazuomi replied. He then asked the men to bring Tsukasa back in the room.

"Are you alright Ikuto?" Tsukasa asked him as he returned to Ikuto's side.

"Y-yeah I am." Ikuto replied. 'Doesn't seem like he heard our conversation. They must've made sure he didn't hear a thing. There must be a room of some sort nearby...'

"Now that we agreed that Ikuto will do this job, I need to make a few arrangements with you Tsukasa," Kazuomi said.

"Y-you're going to do the job?" Tsukasa asked Ikuto with concern.

"I... kinda have to… it's best that you don't know the details, so please just go along with it," Ikuto said sounding apologetic as well.

"A-Alright then, what do you need me to do?" Tsukasa asked Kazuomi with a bit of uncertainty.

"I will need you to enroll Ikuto in to your school, preferably in the same class as our target." Kazuomi said.

"But school already starts next week, it's not easy to accept a new student directly into the 2nd term on such short notice."

"Well , you're the headmaster and he's you're nephew. There shouldn't be any problem enrolling him."

"Fine," Tsukasa said hesitantly.

"Ordinarily, I'd have Ikuto stay here, but Ikuto can stay with you for the convenience of the mission."

"Okay," Ikuto said with a little relief. 'I wouldn't want to stay in this evil place anyways.'

"Well I think it's all settled, then." Kazuomi said. "Ikuto, I'd rather you not get anyone else involved in this, so I will not be allowing you to tell anyone else about the mission. We will constantly have you under surveillance to see your progress. You have a month to take the target. We will take care of everything from there."

"Okay, we're fine with that. We'll be leaving now." Said Tsukasa.

Ikuto and Tsukasa stood up from their chairs and walked out of the room. The two men that escorted them on the way up escorted them down stairs to the car.

As soon as they got in the car, they both stayed silent. Tsukasa had to be dropped back at the party since he was the host while Ikuto decided to go home ahead.

"I'm home," he muttered to himself as he arrived at the house.

Ikuto immediately went up to his room, changed and then flopped on to his bed.

'Looks like I won't be able to meet your friends anymore, Amu. I don't want them to get hurt either,' he thought after remembering his parting words with Amu. He then drifted off as he recalled the night's events.

Ikuto spent the remainder of the week alone in the house. Tsukasa was really busy making the arrangements for Ikuto. Even though he was his nephew, Tsukasa still had to talk to the board and everything. Ikuto mainly stayed home so that he wouldn't meet Amu again. He didn't want to cause her anymore trouble, though she had no idea what danger she was in.

The week went by pretty fast and before Ikuto knew it, he was waking up for the first day of school. After waking up, he changed in to the uniform Tsukasa gave him the day before and went downstairs. He went to the kitchen, finding a note on the table.

_I had to go ahead. I have to do a couple of things being the headmaster. I prepared some breakfast for you. It's on the stove. I'll see you back home after school, as soon as I finish with the work. Tsukasa_

After reading the note, Ikuto ate the breakfast Tsukasa had prepared for him.

"This is good. I didn't know he could get better at cooking…" he said as he ate.

He then grabbed his bag and started heading out.

'Wait,' he thought. 'I better grab my violin, too. I haven't played it since it was given to me after Dad died. I might want to play it today.' So, he went back up to his room, got his violin and then left for school.

'It's a good thing I have a map. Even though this town is small, I never went to the school before.' He thought as he walked up to the school holding the map.

'Wow, Tsukasa-san really made quite a school…' he thought when he reached the school gates.

'This place seems pretty big for a small town school… Where to go now…' he thought, looking around.

"Excuse me," he said to a girl who had just passed him. "Do you know where the first year classrooms are?"

"O-oh…" she said, captured by Ikuto's good looks. "They're on the second floor in the east wing…"

"Ah, I see. Thank you very much." Ikuto said to the girl.

"N-no problem," she said blushing as Ikuto headed towards the stairs.

'Let's see… 1-A… 1-B… here we are…' he thought as he arrived at the 1-C classroom.

"Excuse me…" he said to a man who was about to enter the classroom.

"You must be the transfer student." said the teacher. "Let me just get the class settled so you can come in." The teacher said as he left Ikuto and entered the classroom.

"Everyone please go to your seats!" Ikuto heard the teacher tell the class. The noise coming from the classroom immediately died down.

"Miss Hinamori!" he heard the teacher calling a girl's attention. "If you're quite done daydreaming, I'd like to welcome our transfer student."

"H-hai…" Ikuto heard the girl reply.

'Haha, she sounds scared. He must be some teacher.' He thought.

"Mr. Tsukiyomi, please come in," the teacher said.

'That's my cue,' Ikuto thought as he entered the room.

"I'm Tsukiyomi Ikuto, yoroshiku." He said when he stood in front of the class sounding rather tired and bored.

"Mr. Tsukiyomi… you can sit in front of Ms. Hinamori…" said the teacher.

"Thank you sensei," he said as he walked to his chair.

'There's our target…' he thought as he noticed a golden haired boy sitting in the last row. 'I bet he's popular with the ladies...' he smirked as he noticed the boy's looks.

Ikuto then turned his head to where he was sitting and caught a girl's eye as she looked up.

'Amu?!' he thought. Ikuto then sat down looking surprised like Amu.

"Ikuto!" Amu whispered trying to talk to him. Ikuto turned around to respond to Amu's call.

"I didn't know we were the same year! You look older than me! You didn't tell me you were going to the school here either! But then again, being the nephew of our headmaster, should've been obvious, huh? Well, let's survive this together!" Amu said being friendly.

'Oh no, why is she in this class too? That's right, she's been going here since fourth grade and she did say she was in 7th grade last year. Shit, what do I do? I don't want her to get involved in this anymore. She's already in danger as it is. Maybe if I act unfriendly, she'll get mad and won't talk to me anymore.' He thought quickly.

"I think I'll be able to survive just fine, I'm probably smarter than you anyways. And I think I look just right for my age, thank you. You're the one that looks like a little elementary school kid. That's probably why you're so flat-chested, too" Ikuto said icily.

"Heh?" Amu said a bit loudly.

"Ms. Hinamori! Stop trying to get the transfer student in trouble and please pay attention!" the teacher said calling her attention.

'I hope she got the message.' Ikuto thought.

"I-Ikuto… what happened?" she whispered to him, trying to avoid getting called again.

'Damn, she noticed… I'll try again…' Ikuto thought.

"Stop talking to me, ugly flat-chested girl." He replied simply.

'Sorry Amu… I bet she's mad now. I better try to avoid her after school…'

After a few more periods of class, they eventually had lunch.

'Finally… I'm starving…' Ikuto thought as the bell rang for lunch.

He stood up and began walking out of the classroom, but he was stopped by a voice coming from behind him.

"Ikuto…" said Amu.

'Oh crap, she got me…'

"What do you want?" he snapped at her.

"You do remember me, right? From the ball?" Amu asked him cautiously.

"It isn't hard to forget a girl as short and flat-chested as you…" Ikuto replied.

"Then why are you acting like this? You were so nice during the ball and we had such a good time…" she said trying to keep from getting mad at him for the second time.

"Maybe if you knew what my real self was like, you'd understand…" he replied and walked away.

'Maybe that will give her a hint, but she probably wouldn't understand it…' Ikuto sighed. 'Oh well… I should only be concerned about the mission right now… and lunch. Man, I'm hungry…'

Ikuto kept walking to the cafeteria, following the flow of people going downstairs since he didn't know where it was. Amu just stood rooted to the spot where Ikuto left her looking really confused.

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Afternotes:

I hope you enjoyed the chapter! There wasn't that much progress story-wise but I hope that having it in Ikuto's POV had you understand more :) I'm really using a lot of stuff from the real story, which you've probably noticed. I guess I'm just changing the flow, sorta haha.

I'm not sure when I'll be posting the next chapter… I'll try to do it by next weekend, 'cause this week of school is gonna be busy for me.

Reviews please! Thank you!!


	4. Confusion

notes:

Finally, here's my next chapter. I was getting writer's block so I didn't really get to write the chapter right away. Sorry! I hope you guys enjoy this next chapter!

Just a guide to the text in case you're confused: "being said", 'being thought', _flashbacks/things being remembered_, ---- means that the scene changes.

Hope that helps!

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-At dismissal time-

"Amu, are you okay?" Utau asked her noticing that Amu had her head on her arms, which were on her desk, staring with a blank expression.

"Um… Yeah, sure…" she replied as she continued staring off at something that wasn't there.

'I can't stop thinking about that night…Ikuto…' Amu thought.

"_I'm Ikuto, yoroshiku."_

"_Don't be so nervous," he chuckled. "I'm not gonna bite."_

"_Well then, may I have this dance?"_

"_I've done this a lot so you can just follow me, okay?"_

"_Don't worry, I'm an expert, remember? Just follow me,"_

"_You seem to be sparkling with the stars too,"_

"… _I love personalities like yours, hahaha. You're just so amusing!"_

"_I had a really nice time too."_

"_That does sound like fun… I'll be looking forward to it!"_

Amu couldn't help but smile as she remembered these things.

"_Stop talking to me, ugly flat-chested girl."_

After remembering that, Amu went back into her blank, dazed state.

'What happened? Was he pretending to be nice or pretending to be mean? Is he bipolar or something? I thought that I knew him, quite a bit, especially since he shared so much with me. Was that a lie too? Maybe I really don't know anything…' she continued thinking as she kept walking.

As Amu thought these things, Utau, being a concerned friend, got the rest of the group together to tell them about Amu's strange behaviour.

"She's been acting really weird today. After the transfer student came in, I think they exchanged a few words, then she looked like she was ready to kill someone. She started to cool off the rest of the day, then before lunch she seemed... confused. And not in the usual way. Then ever since lunch, she's been all spacey and stuff. She never has all these reactions in such a short period of time, it's not like her..." Utau told them.

"Hmm... The cause of all this seems to be the transfer student, she probably talked to him during lunch too..." Nagihiko said.

"I wonder what happened... Gahh!! That transfer student makes me mad!" Yaya exclaimed.

"He seems pretty nice though... He's usually quiet and there's a mysterious air about him..." Utau said.

"I think Amu might know him in some way. If she's reacting this much, it wouldn't be from someone we know..." Nagihiko was concluding.

Just then, Amu walked past them heading for the stairs with a spaced out expression.

"Amu, where are you going?" Rima asked her before she could be out of earshot.

"Oh, I'm gonna head home..." she replied.

"But, we're all going to the Royal Garden today, remember?" Yaya reminded.

"Um, I think I'm gonna pass today... I – have a lot on my mind..." Amu replied with Ikuto in mind.

"Y-you can talk about it with us you know..." Kukai said, a bit out of character.

"Sorry but I don't really want to talk about it, no offense guys... bye..." Amu said.

"U-un..." Kukai replied.

"You see what I mean? She's been like that since lunch." Utau said as soon as Amu left.

"Who could possibly make her act this way?" Nagihiko asked.

"Tadase's the only one in mind, but that drama's over and it wasn't him she talked to." Rima said.

"Hey, wait... come to think of it... there's no one Amu knows that we don't, so who could she possibly know that we don't?" Kukai said as the thought entered his head.

"She hasn't met anyone new lately. I mean, when could she have met someone new? Amu-chi's always with us." Yaya said.

"Wait a second, there was one time she wasn't with us... at the ball." Utau remembered.

"So, that boy's..." Nagihiko began to say.

"!!" was everyone's reaction, because they all remembered the boy she met at the ball; the boy whom she didn't talk about or introduce to them yet.

----

Amu kept walking and walking, unaware of where she was and where she was heading to. Only one thing was in her mind.

'Ikuto...'

_"...He's helped me get out of a lot of trouble too…" he said. "but not all of it," he added really softly._

__

"What was the last thing you said?" Amu asked, not hearing the boy's words.

"O-oh, it's nothing…" he said in reply.

'What did he say that time? I have a feeling that I would understand better if I heard what he said!' Amu thought, angry at herself.

_"Maybe if you knew what my real self was like, you'd understand…"_

'What did he mean by that? I bet there was some hidden meaning in there, but how am I supposed to understand?! 'Real self?' What the heck is that supposed to mean?!' she thought with a lot of frustration.

"Why can't I be smarter?!" she shouted.

Amu then sighed thinking, 'Shouting is going to get me nowhere, I know that from experience...'

"Huh? Where am I?" she said as she finally noticed her surroundings.

'I've just been walking, I didn't even notice where I was walking to... I don't think I've been here before...' she thought as she observed her surroundings.

Amu then heard a faint sound.

"Huh?" Amu said 'Was that... music?'

She then started looking around.

'I don't see anyone...'

She began walking around trying to find the sound again.

'There it is again!' she thought as she heard the sound again. 'It's coming from this way!'

She then followed the sound as it got louder and louder until Amu saw where it was coming from.

'A greenhouse? I didn't know we had one...' she thought as she saw the large glass building. 'It looks a bit like the Royal Garden... The sound's coming from inside... I'm gonna find the source.'

Amu walked into the building, seeing lots of beautiful plants and flowers all over the place.

'It's so beautiful in here... The music adds to the effect too...' she thought as she walked on.

'The music seems kinda sad and apologetic... I wonder why...' she thought as she got closer and closer to the source.

'The music just keeps drawing me closer... I think it's coming from here...' she thought as she stopped in front of a wall of beautiful flowers.

'It's such a beautiful tune... I love how the flowers seem to bloom more, even if the music isn't exactly happy...' she thought as she began to walk through the wall of flowers, almost as if the music was pulling her to its source.

'Who is that?' she thought as she walked into a clearing, seeing a boy with a violin facing away from her. 'So it's a violin that's making the music...'

'I don't know why, but I feel like the music is trying to tell me something... just me...' she thought as she stood and listened to the music of the boy in front of her.

The boy then turned his head to look at his violin and Amu got to see his face.

'W-Wait, t-that's–'

"Amu? What are you doing here?" Ikuto said in a surprised tone. He had turned around after noticing someone from the corner of his eye when he turned his head.

"I-Ikuto!" Amu said in surprise as well.

After staring at each other in surprise for a few more seconds, they both looked away. Several things began entering Amu's head.

'After thinking so much about what happened earlier, why do I have to see him again?! I'm still confused... What the heck am I supposed to say now?! Is there even anything to say? Why do i keep bumping into him anyways? Is it fate or something like that? I never really believed in it, but it seems pretty believable at this point. I never really thought about it, but right after I wished for a 'special someone' he came along. Ever since then, I've been bumping into him. Maybe it is fate. Maybe this meeting is fate...' Amu thought.

Simultaneously, several thoughts were going through Ikuto's mind as well.

'Just when I was thinking of her, she shows up. I wonder if she noticed that the song was for her... probably not. It's not like you can hear it in the music... Gah! What am I supposed to do now? I probably made her really confused and stuff, she looked it during class and after school. What do I do now? Do I keep the act going? I might as well since I already started it... I feel bad for putting her through all this confusion. Maybe I should just come clean... No! I can't stop now. This is all for her safety. She needs to understand that, but there's no way I can explain it to her without getting her involved in all this. As long as she's safe, I don't care if I'm ruining her image of me. Well... maybe just a little. I can't possibly be hurting her anyways. It's not like she likes me or anything... or does she? I admit that **I** like her. That's why I'm doing all this. Maybe I'm hurting my chances with her... No, no, no. Stop thinking about these things! She can't get involved in this! I have to put up the act, it's for her safety...' Ikuto thought, not completely convincing himself

They continued busying themselves with their thoughts until Amu decided to break the silence.

"I-I didn't know you played violin..." Amu said.

"Why would I have to tell you that? It's not like it's any of your business, ugly." Ikuto said trying to act unfriendly.

"I'm just curious is all, no need to be so defensive!" Amu said in annoyance.

They were silent once again until Amu tried to break the silence... again.

"You know..." she began. "You're playing is really nice... It was such a lovely tune. The moment I heard it, I was instantly drawn here..."

Ikuto was a bit shocked and flattered, but he still kept silent.

"It sounded kinda sad... but apologetic..." she continued. "There was also something in your music...that made me feel... like it was speaking to **me**..." As she said this she closed her eyes with a nostalgic sort of smile.

'That's because it was...' Ikuto thought. 'I was sad that I was doing this and apologizing for it. That's what I was thinking anyways. I'm surprised she could hear that... but maybe because I was trying to convey that to her... she heard it...'

"I didn't know... that music could reach you like that..." she said as she put her hand over her heart.

Ikuto's eyes opened in shock.

'It reminds me of what Dad said to me when I was younger...'

_"No, no. That's not it..." Ikuto's father said as he stopped Ikuto while he was playing._

_"But, I'm doing it perfectly! I can hear it!" Ikuto protested._

_"You are, but there's no emotion in your playing. You're only playing for perfection." Ikuto's father told him._

_"Isn't it supposed to be perfect?" Ikuto asked in confusion._

_His father sighed.  
_

_"Music isn't meant to be played just to achieve perfection... It's meant to reach out and move people; to touch them. Remember that, Ikuto. When you pick up your violin, don't play it for the sake of making it perfect, play it to share the beauty of your piece and reach out and move the hearts of others." His father said to him._

_"That sounds hard! How do I even know if I'm doing that?" Ikuto said with a frown._

_"It's not hard as long as you put your heart into it. When you feel it in there," Ikuto's father pointed to Ikuto's heart. "then you know that you're moving others' hearts, too."_

_"Wow! It sounds so cool! I wanna do that! Dad, can you show me?" Ikuto asked with his eyes sparkling._

_"Of course," his father replied. He then picked up his violin and played for his son._

'Those were good times. Of course, I was just a kid back then and I never fully understood what he meant. Now I do. Reaching the hearts of others... it really gives you a good feeling.' He thought with a smile as he saw Amu smiling as she remembered his music.

Amu noticed his smile and said "You're smiling!" continuing to smile herself.

'I can't believe I got him to smile.' she thought to herself happily 'I really love it – when he smiles...'

Ikuto continued to smile.

'Wait a sec! I'm supposed to put on the mean act! Crap!' he remembered.

He looked at Amu smiling again and thought, 'I don't wanna wipe away that smile on her face... Maybe I'll let it go for now... I have such warm feelings right now, I probably can't do it anyway... but, if I put on that act again, after today, she'll get confused all over again. Maybe I should just avoid her from now on... I'll see how I feel after starting the mission and maybe meeting with Kazuomi. I bet he'll call me in sometome soon to see how much progress I'm making. I really don't feel right about doing the mission, but with Amu in danger, I have to. I know that there's no way I can hide her or take her away from him without causing myself and other innocent people around me, like Tsukasa-san, a lot of trouble. I'll just be putting her in even more danger too... I'll just play it safe and do what Kazuomi says... for now. When I come up with a plan, I'll make sure he doesn't get what he wants. I'll also find a way to escape from the chains he's put on me. I'm no one's pet or minion, I'll make sure he knows that.' Ikuto thought with a new found determination.

"I'm gonna go, I have important things to do right now." Ikuto told Amu as he packed away his violin and grabbed his stuff.

"A-Alright. Bye! See you tomorrow!" Amu said still with a happy mood and a smile on her face.

"Un," Ikuto replied as he began walking away.

----

"I'm home!" Ikuto heard Tsukasa shout downstairs.

"Finally..." he said as he took off the manga from on top of his face and sat up from his lying down postion.

Ikuto went downstairs and walked into the kitchen, where Tsukasa was.

"Ikuto. How was your first day of school?" Tsukasa asked with a cheerful smile.

"It was very... active." Ikuto said trying to find the right words.

"I see..." Tsukasa said. "Is there something you want to talk to me about?"

"Yeah, actually." Ikuto replied. "I need you to help me come up with a plan for the mission."

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notes:

I hope it isn't too confusing or anything ahaha. I'm glad that I finally managed to post it! I hope you enjoyed it! It's very Amuto as is the rest of the story, I also included a part there about tadase, really short though. Basically I wanted to show that like in the story she sorta got together with Tadase, but she broke up with him :P Don't hate me for that! She's got Ikuto now :)

Thanks to everyone for reading my fanfic! I really wasn't sure if everyone would like it, but I've been getting good comments and reviews. I know I still have things to improve on, so bear with me!

By the way! I have another hectic week of school ahead, so I'm probably gonna post the next chapter next friday at the earliest. I hope you guys can hold out for another week! Thanks again for reading!


	5. Beginning

Author's Notes:

Urgh… I'm starting to get bored writing my own story, so I'm gonna tweek it a bit :) :) Someone asked for pervy Ikuto, so I'm gonna put some of that here, but I'm not so good with that stuff so it might be a bad attempt haha. I'm probably gonna speed up my story and make it a bit less detailed too. Enjoy!!

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"So is that the plan then?" Tsukasa asked.

"Yeah, I guess so... Do you think it'll work?" Ikuto asked with a bit of concern.

"Well, there are a few flaws in the plan, you'll really need to use all the time you have in the month's deadline and I'm sure this will be fairly difficult, but if it's you, I'm sure you'll be able to pull it off." Tsukasa said and smiled.

Ikuto sighed. "Thank you"

They then bid each other good night and Ikuto went up to his room. The moment Ikuto got into his room, he flopped down onto his bed.

'I think the plan will go well. I hope it does... I know that I definitely have to avoid Amu as much as possible so she doesn't get suspicious. I'm sure if she knew that I was doing this mission to protect her, she wouldn't like it one bit. Mataku, this month will really be long and tiring...'

Ikuto then fell asleep thinking about the long month ahead of him.

_-The next day-_

"Haaa~" Amu sighed happily as she finished yet another bottle of milk. 'Yesterday was such a good day! I'm just so happy whenever I'm with Ikuto. I discover more and more about him every time. I wonder if I'll be bumping into him some more today...'

"Oh crap!" Amu shouted when she saw the time.

"I'm late!!!" she said. She quickly grabbed all of her stuff and ran straight to school.

'Why am I always late?! Why? WHY? I always wake up early and then I brush my teeth then take a shower and then I-' her thoughts were cut off as she saw a familiar blue haired boy as she got to the 1st Year hallway.

"Ikuuutooo!!" she shouted when she saw him up ahead of her. Ikuto heard Amu's call, knowing exactly who it was, and walked a little faster into the classroom.

"Huh?" Amu said. 'Is he doing that stupid thing again?! God, he's getting really annoying!!'

Amu walked into the classroom and went to her seat behind Ikuto. Utau then walked up to her as soon as Amu was going to sit down.

"We're gonna need to talk. Lunch. Royal Garden. with the rest of the gang." Utau said keeping it short since the teacher was almost to their classroom.

"Hee? About what?" she asked as Utau went to her seat beside Kukai.

"Ms. Hinamori! Please sit down now." the teacher said as he entered the classroom.

Amu then obeyed the teacher and immediately sat down. 'This teacher's going to remember me for all of this, I know it...'

_-lunch time-_

'Fooood, foooood, foooood...' was what Amu was thinking the moment the bell rang for lunch. She was heading to the cafeteria when she suddenly remembered that she was supposed to meet the others at the Royal Garden. 'They better give me food or I swear I will eat them...'

Amu turned around and walked to the Royal Garden. She entered the huge glass building and walked to the large table where everyone was already waiting for her. She sat down grudgingly when she got to an empty chair, her stomach rumbling.

"Which one of you has food? Yaya? Kukai?" she asked half drooling.

"Sorry Amu, we're not feeding you until you tell us what we want to know." Utau said.

"I'll tell you whatever! Just give me food! PLEASE! I'm starving here..." Amu said.

"Alright, question number 1... Rima?" Utau said.

"How do you know the transfer student?" Rima asked.

"I met him at the ball." she said immediately.

"Huh, so you were right Nagi..." Kukai said. Nagihiko smirked.

"OK, give her a cookie Yaya." Utau told her.

"B-but my cookies..." Yaya whined.

"Just give her the cookie!!" Utau shouted at her.

"Fine, no need to shout Utau-chi..." Yaya said and grudgingly gave Amu the cookie.

"Question 2... Kukai?" Utau said.

"No! I want to ask it!!" Rima said loudly. "What did you guys do at the ball?" she asked almost threateningly.

Amu then told them what happened and how she and Ikuto met. She didn't go into so much detail, like their conversations, because she felt that she should respect Ikuto's privacy and not tell everyone all about him.

"Ooohh... He sounds really nice! It's like a beautiful love story!!" Yaya said with a sparkle in her eyes. "But then, why were you so depressed and stuff yesterday Amu-chi?"

"Oh, um well..." and Amu told them how Ikuto was saying mean things to her and giving her the cold shoulder, etc, etc.

"Why would he do that? He seemed like such a nice guy when you talked about him earlier..." Utau said.

"Hmmm, something must've happened between the time you guys parted and the time when he arrived at school..." Nagihiko said.

"No need to be all smart and stuff..." Rima said teasingly.

"Or maybe he just decided that he didn't like Amu and decided to be mean to her, ahahahah..." Utau said jokingly.

"That's mean Utau-chi" Yaya said.

"Are we done here?" Amu asked ignoring what Utau had said.

"Yeah, I guess..."

"Can I please have some food now?" Amu said pleadingly.

"Oh right, Kukai," Utau called him and snapped her fingers.

"I'm not a dog you know..." he said as he gave Amu some onigiri and sushi.

"Finally!! Itadakimasu~!!" Amu said hurriedly and ate like she hasn't eaten in a week. Amu just talked with them for a while, enjoying the time she was spending with her friends, until something caught her attention outside the Royal Garden.

'Huh? Since when has Ikuto been hanging out with Tadase?' she thought as she saw Ikuto walking past the Royal Garden with 5th grade prince. (Note: As in her prince when she was in 5th grade, not her prince who's in the 5th grade)

"I'm gonna... head back to the... classroom now..." she lied. "Don't want to be late, again..."

"Yeah, ok. See you later..." Utau said. Everyone else then said goodbye to her as well.

Amu quickly walked out of the Royal Garden trying to catch up with Ikuto and Tadase and found them sitting on a grassy slope nearby. She hid in nearby bushes so she could spy on them.

_-Ikuto's "POV"-_

"So, what's your family like?" Ikuto asked Tadase. 'You're family must be perfect, little 'prince'. Everything I just told you about my 'family' is a lie, ahahaha.'

"Pretty normal, I guess. I live with my mom and dad. My grandmother stays with us, but she's pretty sick right now." he said a bit sadly.

"That doesn't sound too good... What happened to her?" Ikuto asked.

"I don't know, it must've been stress or something. They were all arguing a lot for a while. I think it had something to do with one of our family heirlooms, but no one would tell me what was going on..." Tadase said sadly.

'Family heirloom? Must be what Easter's after...' Ikuto thought.

"Hey, have you ever heard of Easter?" Ikuto asked him.

"Easter? I don't think I have... What is it?" Tadase asked curiously.

"I think it's a company of some sort... I – heard about it when I was abroad." Ikuto lied. 'So he doesn't know, huh?

"Easter, Easter... Wait, come to think of it... I think I've heard that name somewhere..." Tadase said as he tried to remember.

"That's right! The name came up in several of the fights the adults were having. I remember hearing 'Easter' and 'key' a lot..." Tadase said in a sad tone once again.

"Oh, I see..." Ikuto said. 'Poor kid...'

They sat in silence for a while, both lost in their own thoughts. Tadase then looked at his watch.

"Oh no! We're gonna be late! We have 5 minutes to get back to the classroom!!" Tadase exclaimed.

"We should probably get going then..." Ikuto said calmly.

"I'm gonna run ahead! I don't want to be reprimanded by the teacher!!" Tadase said as he ran towards the high school building.

'Heh, so he's a goody goody little boy.' Ikuto smirked.

"I guess there is a relation then..." Ikuto said, his thoughts back on the mission. "Guess there's nothing more to do today then..."

Ikuto then headed back towards the building.

_-back to the original POV-_

Amu was just sitting in the bushes thinking about the conversation of Ikuto and Tadase.

'Judging from what Ikuto said just now, it seems like he was purposely trying to find things out from Tadase. It didn't sound like it though. It sounded like the regular flow of conversation... Then again, Ikuto's a good actor...' she thought remembering the little act he had put on.

'Wait a minute...'

"Did he say 5 minutes?! I probably only have 2!!! Craaapp!!" She shouted as she ran at top speed towards the high school building.

Since she was running at top speed, she reached the building pretty quick, but she was still almost late. She ran hurriedly up the stairs and because she didn't pay attention to her footing, she tripped on the last step.

'Shit!' she thought as she was falling. She noticed that the pain she was anticipating didn't come and saw an arm wrapped around her that had stopped her from falling.

'Ikuto...' she thought as she looked up to see who stopped her fall.

"Huh, you really are flat chested," Ikuto said.

"Heh?" Amu said and her momentary 'knight in shining armor' image of Ikuto broke into thousands of pieces as she registered what she just heard and noticed his arm was around her chest, rather than her waist. She immediately pushed Ikuto away from her.

"Y-y-you hentai!!!" she yelled.

"I'm only telling the truth," he smirked.

"Grrrr" she decided not to strangle him and instead stormed off towards the classroom.

"Oh and by the way, strawberry printed underwear is for elementary school students," he said."But then again, you look and act like one, so it probably doesn't matter..." Ikuto smirked.

Amu stopped walking and immediately turned a fierce shade of red. She slowly turned around and had a you're-gonna-die-now look on her face.

"YOU HEEEEEENNNNTAAAAAAIIIII!!!!!!!!!!" she yelled as she jumped at him and knocked him to the ground. She then grabbed Ikuto's neck and began strangling him and shaking his neck.

"You perverted sicko!!" she yelled as she continued strangling him.

About everyone on that floor heard her yells and so they peeked out of their classrooms to see what was going on. Amu simply shot them all a back-off-or-die look and that was enough to send them back inside their classrooms without saying anything.

"Ms. Hinamori..." she heard someone say sternly behind her. She then stopped what she was doing and turned to look up at the voice's owner.

"Why are you strangling my nephew?" Tsukasa asked.

Amu immediately let go of Ikuto but he was already knocked out by that time.

"Ehe, ehehehehehe..." she laughed nervously.

-------------------------

Notes:

Man, I had fun writing this one! I guess I made this one a bit funner and less serious :P I think I might've changed the personalities of some people, so sorry for that :P Tell me what you think about my slight change in style. REVIEW PLEASE!!!


	6. Ouch

Man, I haven't updated in soooo long. I hate school :( We even had class on Saturday! Ah well, I hope you enjoy the chapter. I've been getting a lot from the anime now haha. This is the first time I'm going to say it, but I do not own Shugo Chara or its characters.

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"Nnnn…" Ikuto began to stir.

"Oh thank god you're awake!" Amu said.

"Where am I?"

"You're in the nurse's office…" Amu replied.

"Why am I here?"

"Umm, well…" Amu laughed nervously.

'Oh yeah, she jumped on me and started strangling me until I passed out… Damn, that girl is pretty strong…'

"You were the one that got me in here..." Ikuto said.

"O-Oh r-right, ahahaha... W-Well it was you're fault for being a pervert..." Amu defended herself.

"Are you really sure I'm the pervert?" Ikuto asked her.

"Well, yes." Amu said.

"How long have I been here?"

"About an hour I think..."

"Have you been here this entire time?" he asked curiously.

"Y-Yea... I wanted to make sure I didn't kill you or anything so I was just sitting here beside you the whole time..." she blushed.

"So you were watching me sleep then?" Ikuto smirked.

"Yea... W-Wait! I-It isn't what you think!" Amu said flustered.

"Who's the pervert now?" Ikuto said still smirking.

"I-It's still you! I'm not a pervert! It's not like I was thinking anything bad while I was watching you sleep!"

"Oh, so you do admit you were watching me," Ikuto said with amusement.

"N-No! W-Wait! I guess I was, but... Urgh... BAKA!!" she said and hit him in the head.

The curtains then opened and the school nurse came in.

"Ms. Hinamori, from hearing all your screaming and violence, it safe to assume that you are hazardous to Mr. Tsukiyomi's health..." she said as she saw Ikuto with a huge bump on his head. "I think it's best if you leave..."

"I-It's not my fault! Ikuto's the one-"

"Out!" the nurse ordered her. Amu immediately left the room, but not before she could shoot Ikuto an angry look.

'Damn that girl is so violent. First she knocks me out, then she gives me this huge bump, ow.' he cringed as he touched it. 'She really is a danger to my health... and my personal safety... Man, I need to sleep it off... the mission's gonna get stressful too...'

-near dismissal time in the nurse's office-

Ikuto was awake and reading manga while he sat on the bed. He decided to stay there until he had to go home. 'Who wants to go back to class?' he thought.

"Ikuto," Tsukasa greeted him.

"Oh hey. I'm assuming the nurse told you?" Ikuto said with no surprise.

"Well, you are a student and my nephew... So are you alright then?" Tsukasa asked Ikuto.

"Yea I guess. Man that Hinamori girl is violent..." he said as he rubbed the bump on his head.

"You teased her didn't you?" Tsukasa asked, knowing his nephew too well.

"Yea I did, it's fun to mess with her..." Ikuto smiled a little.

"I haven't seen you smile like that for a while... It makes me happy to know that you found a reason to be happy despite all of the sad things that have happened to you..." Tsukasa said with a soft smile.

"I can't believe it myself, but that's the heart I guess." Ikuto shrugged.

"So have you made any progress? I know it's just been a day, but..." Tsukasa said.

"Yea, I started talking to him." Ikuto answered.

"Oh have you? Did you get anything?"

"Yea... He said that their family has an old heirloom. His parents would fight about it a lot until his grandmother got sick. He said 'key' and 'Easter' came up a lot in the fights." Ikuto said.

"From what you said, it sounds like his family's had problems with Easter concerning this 'key' that they own for quite a while. His grandmother got sick 4 years ago, I think."

"Maybe Easter got impatient with his family, so they put me on this mission..." Ikuto told Tsukasa.

"That's probably it..."

"Though I don't know anything about this conflict between Easter and Tadase's family, what Easter wants me to do is probably a bad thing from either perspective. But knowing Easter, everything's okay to them... no matter who gets hurt in the process..." he said bitterly.

"Well that's how Easter is and we can't change that..." Tsukasa sighed.

"Well, maybe we can... If some of the things I planned work out well... Maybe we can make Easter different..." Ikuto said thoughtfully.

"I don't mean to dampen your spirit, but I doubt we can pull anything that big... Easter is huge, it's hard to make an impact on the entire company..." Tsukasa contradicted him.

"As long as we can get to the director, we can get to the entire company..." Ikuto said.

"It'll be hard to get to him, but if you're this determined..."

"I will try as hard as I can to take them down. I don't want any more innocent people to be affected by them." Ikuto said with determination.

"You remind me so much of your father. This is the same thing he said before..." Tsukasa didn't want to finish the sentence.

"I won't die like he did. I know I can do this." Ikuto said with confidence.

Tsukasa chuckled. "Why don't we go home? I have nothing more to do today anyways."

"Ok. The nurse said I'll be fine anyways. It's a good thing that girl didn't give me any brain damage." Ikuto laughed.

Ikuto got his things by the bed and walked out of the office with Tsukasa.

Over the next few days, Ikuto was trying to get his plan into action. He was able to find out some more about Tadase and his family in his daily meetings with him and one day, Tadase invited him over to his house.

"Really? Are you sure?" Ikuto asked.

"Yea, I'm positive. I haven't had friends over in a while either, so I bet my parents will be happy." Tadase said reassuringly.

'No friends over in a while? I wonder why that is. But I think I can make an assumption on this little 'prince' here.' Ikuto smirked a little.

"Well as long as it's okay with you." Ikuto said.

"Yea sure. Oh, look at the time, I have to get going soon. So, Saturday?" Tadase said before he was going to leave Ikuto.

"Ok Saturday. See ya."

'This is all going according to plan' Ikuto smiled to himself after Tadase left. 'Now that step 1 is complete, it's about time to move on to step 2... I'm in a good mood today, so I think I'll play the violin. Where's that greenhouse?'

Ikuto eventually found his way to the greenhouse and went inside. He found the same spot as before and took his violin out of his case.

'I think I'll play Yuuki no Uta...' Ikuto thought (Note: Yuuki no Uta is the song from episode 49 when Amu was singing while he played his violin.)

He started playing and before he knew it , he was singing it in his head.

'dare ni mo makenai, yume ga aru, arukidaso-'

"mune hatte, watashi dake no michi ga aru, shinjiru no sahon ta sa"

Ikuto immediately stopped playing to see who was singing with him, but he already had an idea.

"So we meet here once again," Ikuto said.

"I heard the violin again and followed the sound here, again... I liked that song." Amu said.

"Why'd you come here? You already know that I'm the one who's playing," Ikuto asked her.

"Oh, I was just gonna tell you that I know." Amu said.

"You know what? Are you trying to say you're smart or something? I doubt that," he smirked.

"Yoouu..." she began, but she regained her composure and answered his question. "I know all about what's going on with you; about Easter and this mission you're doing. I even know what Easter's after."

Ikuto stood there frozen, the violin almost dropping from his hand.

"W-What?" Ikuto said in shock.

--------------------------

Notes:

That chapter was a lot shorter than usual, probably because the next chapter's gonna be long-ish :P I hope you enjoyed it! Cliffie! Yay! Haha. I'll try to update sooner, I promise!


	7. Busted

Next chapter finally!! I've been trying to post it but I couldn't upload my file for some reason. There was some error, so I had to wait a while. Anyways, enjoy the chapter

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Ikuto stared at Amu in silence, his hands barely grasping his violin.

"H-How could you possibly know?" Ikuto said still in shock.

"Well…"

-dismissal time, the day Ikuto was attacked by Amu-

'I wonder how Ikuto's doing...' Amu thought as she grabbed her bags and books.

'I know! I'll go check on him now! The reasons he's in the nurse's office are my fault anyways...' she thought guiltily. 'But he's the one who provoked me... man that made me mad... I'll visit him anyway...'

After getting all her things, she headed towards the nurse's office. She didn't try to hurry, because she was thinking of what to say when she gets there.

"I'm sorry you made me do this to you... No, that's not right. Please forgive me for my rudeness earlier... There's no way I'm going to say that to that pervert, it's too formal. I'm sorry..." Amu stopped walking as she heard voices coming from behind Ikuto's curtains.

'Is that Tsukasa's voice I hear? Maybe I should hide somewhere so they don't notice me eavesdropping...' Amu found a corner in the office to hide in and eavesdropped on the conversation.

(the italicized part is things going on with Amu while they're having the conversation)

"... So are you alright then?" Amu heard Tsukasa ask Ikuto.

"Yea I guess. Man that Hinamori girl is violent..." she heard Ikuto reply. _'Violent? I am not violent! Only when I'm mad...'_

"You teased her didn't you?" Tsukasa asked, knowing his nephew too well. _'Yea that's right, he did!!'_

"Yea I did, it's fun to mess with her..." she heard Ikuto say. _Amu restrained herself from going in there and attacking him again._

"I haven't seen you smile like that for a while... It makes me happy to know that you found a reason to be happy despite all of the sad things that have happened to you..." Tsukasa said.

"I can't believe it myself, but that's the heart I guess." Ikuto shrugged.

_'That's the heart? What does he mean by that?' Amu thought to herself curiously._

"So have you made any progress? I know it's just been a day, but..." Tsukasa said.

"Yea, I started talking to him." Ikuto answered.

_'Him? Are they talking about Tadase?' Amu thought curiously._

"Oh have you? Did you get anything?"

"Yea... He said that their family has an old heirloom. His parents would fight about it a lot until his grandmother got sick. He said 'key' and 'Easter' came up a lot in the fights." Ikuto said.

_'Oh that's what I heard earlier too... I guess he was trying to get stuff out of Tadase then... Why am I spying so much today?'_

"From what you said, it sounds like his family's had problems with Easter concerning this 'key' that they own for quite a while. His grandmother got sick 4 years ago, I think."

"Maybe Easter got impatient with his family, so they put me on this mission..." Ikuto told Tsukasa.

_'Mission? What mission? He was put on a mission? Was getting that info part of this mission?' Amu thought with curiosity and shock._

"That's probably it..."

"Though I don't know anything about this conflict between Easter and Tadase's family, what Easter wants me to do is probably a bad thing from either perspective. But knowing Easter, everything's okay to them... no matter who gets hurt in the process..." he said bitterly.

_'Ikuto must really hate this Easter company... From the way he said it, it sounds like he has some history with them. Well they do sound evil...' Amu thought._

"Well that's how Easter is and we can't change that..." Tsukasa sighed.

"Well, maybe we can... If some of the things I planned work out well... Maybe we can make Easter different..." Ikuto said thoughtfully.

"I don't mean to dampen your spirit, but I doubt we can pull anything that big... Easter is huge, it's hard to make an impact on the entire company..." Tsukasa contradicted him.

"As long as we can get to the director, we can get to the entire company..." Ikuto said.

"It'll be hard to get to him, but if you're this determined..."

"I will try as hard as I can to take them down. I don't want any more innocent people to be affected by them." Ikuto said with determination.

"You remind me so much of your father. This is the same thing he said before..." Tsukasa didn't want to finish the sentence.

"I won't die like he did. I know I can do this." Ikuto said with confidence.

_'That's right, his father died... He's such a great person. Doing this to save other innocent people. He's really great.' Amu smiled and blushed a little._

Tsukasa chuckled. "Why don't we go home? I have nothing more to do today anyways."

"Ok. The nurse said I'll be fine anyways. It's a good thing that girl didn't give me any brain damage." Ikuto laughed.

_'He's making me feel guilty...'_

Amu heard Ikuto get off the bed and walk out of the office with Tsukasa. Amu waited for the footsteps to fade away some more before she came out of her hiding place.

"Ok, good. They're gone. I'm amazed they didn't see me..." Amu stood up and wiped the dirt from her skirt.

"That was an interesting conversation. I think I get Ikuto more now... sorta. I'm still kinda confused, but I think I have the basic idea of what's going on. This does explain a lot, though. I do wonder what exactly his mission is..." She said to herself.

_"Something must've happened between the time you guys parted and the time when he arrived at school..." _

Amu suddenly remembered Nagihiko saying earlier.

"So that's why he's avoiding me! He must've been assigned this mission that time when he left and he can't talk to me much because of it. Man I wish he'd told me!! But then again, he probably would've if he could..." Amu stayed silent for a moment and thought to herself.

"I wonder what this mission is, cuz now that i think about it, his mission probably isn't getting this information... From what I heard in Ikuto's conversations with Tsukasa and Tadase, it sounded like he was just trying to get the information to figure out this mission of his or something like that. He did say 'Maybe Easter got impatient with his family, so they put me on this mission...' which means that he didn't know why he was put on the mission... Also, from what he said, what was it? 'Though I don't know anything about this conflict between Easter and Tadase's family, what Easter wants me to do is probably a bad thing from either perspective. But knowing Easter, everything's okay to them... no matter who gets hurt in the process...' It says right there that he didn't know all this info, so that must mean he gathered it himself. This mission of his does sound like it could get someone hurt. He did say that it's a bad thing from either perspective but everything's okay with Easter no matter who gets hurt in the process, so someone could get hurt. I wonder if he has to actually hurt someone though... That's probably why he's so against it..." Amu continued to think for a while, but she decided to leave before the nurse comes back.

'Wouldn't want her asking me why I'm here at dismissal when no one's in the room, would I?' she thought as she grabbed her things and left the office.

When Amu got to the gates of the school, something came in to her head.

"That key that they mentioned... I think I know it... I don't know why, but it sounds so familiar... Why does it sound so familiar?" Amu started thinking really hard about it much to no avail. She kept trying to remember even as she was returning home.

"Tadaima!" she said when she got home.

"Okairi, Amu. You're home late aren't you?" Amu's mom said as she approached the stairs Amu was climbing to get to her room.

"I was with the others today. We went to the Royal Garden and did stuff today..." Amu lied.

"Oh alright then. Dinner should be ready in 20 minutes, so why don't you shower and change first?" Her mom said.

"Yea, sure." Amu said before disappearing into her room.

The moment she got in to her room, she put down all her stuff from school and grabbed the clothes she was going to change in to. She went to the bathroom, undressed and entered the shower.

"Ah! It feels so nice..." she said when she turned the water on.

'Oh man, I left the shampoo on the counter...' Amu stepped out of the shower and grabbed the bottle of shampoo. Before getting back in the shower, she noticed something peeking out from under a set of drawers on the floor.

'Are?(Note: that's japanese so it's pronounced a-re not ar) Oh, it's a picture...' Amu picked it up and looked at it. It was a picture of Tadase when he was smaller with his grandmother.

'Huh? Where'd I get this picture? Oh yeah, I remember. His grandmother gave it to me before.' She stepped back in to the shower.

'Why'd she give it to me again?' she thought as she shampooed her hair.

'Oh yeah. She wanted to show me a picture of Tadase when he was a kid. She kept bragging about how cute he was back then. I remember Tadase blushing so much when he saw me holding it. She let me keep it, but I forgot the reason. I remember it was funny though...' she thought to herself.

After a few seconds, she realized something.

"That's where I heard about the key! I heard it from Tadase's grandmother!" she exclaimed.

"Onee-chan! It's time for dinner!" Amu heard Ami, her little sister, yell outside the door.

"Okay! I'll be right down!" Amu replied to her. She then quickly finished showering and changing, then ran downstairs.

The next day, Amu kept trying to remember what she and Tadase's grandmother were talking about when the key was mentioned.

'Was it something that just came up in a conversation? No, I don't see how it could've come up in a normal conversation. When did she mention it? Now that I think about it, she was pretty sick most of the days I went over, so it shouldn't be so hard to think of which conversation it was. How many times was she even well enough to talk to me? I did go over the entire time I was going out with Tadase which was from 5th grade til... 6th grade? Wow, I went out with him for a whole year? What did I see in him? He was such a baby and such a girly boy. I think he was more feminine than I was at that time since I was pretty tomboy because of my Cool and Spicy character. He seemed more girly than Nagihiko too and Nagihiko's the girly boy, no offense Nagihiko...' she thought to herself (Comment: Take that Tadase }:))

Amu kept thinking about the key for the next few days. She also noticed Ikuto hanging out with Tadase over those days as well.

'So, he must have to get closer to Tadase for his mission... He got all the info he needed that time a few days ago, so he wouldn't be talking to Tadase anymore if he didn't have to, right? I bet that he can't talk to anyone else about his mission, which is probably why he isn't talking to me or anyone else besides Tadase. Hmm... thinking back about it, Easter's probably gonna do something to Tadase's family. They were arguing for a while and Tsukasa said that Tadase's family and Easter were fighting about this key for a while. Ikuto even said, 'Maybe Easter got impatient with his family, so they put me on this mission...' Which means that Easter is going to take action on this fight about the key. I can't really think of what they'd make Ikuto do, but he did say, '...what Easter wants me to do is probably a bad thing from either perspective. But knowing Easter, everything's okay to them... no matter who gets hurt in the process...' That means that getting close to Tadase isn't the only thing they want him to do, because it's not a bad thing to do. They probably are either going to have Ikuto kill Tadase, kidnap him, steal from Tadase's family or do something else bad to Tadase's family, because they're getting Ikuto close to Tadase for a reason, right? Something personal would have to be involved, or something directly involving Tadase or his family. I think he probably has to kidnap Tadase, because Ikuto said no matter who gets HURT in the process, so that's the most probable answer. He didn't say no matter who gets KILLED in the process and plus, killing him is a bit extreme, don't you think?' Amu concluded. 'Wow, I think I got just about everything, now about the key...'

The day after Amu concluded just about everything about Ikuto's issues, she remembered what happened regarding the key.

'That's right! The key came up that same day she gave me the picture! I remember what happened and what we talked about now! It started when-'

"Ms. Hinamori! Pay attention!" the teacher yelled at her.

"H-Hai..." she said a bit embarassed. 'Damn it... I don't remember what I was thinking about anymore...'

-dismissal time-

"Finally, class is over..." Amu said to herself.

"Hey, Ikuto," she said wanting to ask something about his mission. Ikuto didn't respond to her and continued walking towards the door of the classroom.

"Hey! I'm talking to you-" she said trying to walk up to him until she tripped over someone's book and fell to the floor.

Ikuto turned around to look at her and laughed as he left the classroom.

"Stupid Ikuto, still ignoring me..." she said as she began to stand up. 'I don't want him to keep ignoring me... I know! I'll tell him that I know everything today. I should also probably give him the info I know about the key. I bet it'd help him a lot. I wonder what he's planning... I remember from the conversation with Tsukasa that he was trying to do something against Easter... I bet I could get in on the plan now or maybe come up with a better one to help him out... I'm getting excited now! I can't wait to talk to him... I bet he'll be shocked hahaha...'

-present time, when Amu confronted Ikuto in the greenhouse-

Amu told Ikuto everything. She told him how she got the first clue and how she pieced everything together and figured it all out.

"Heh, I guess it was my fault in the end that you found out..." Ikuto laughed a bit. "I'm surprised you pieced it all together Amu... I guess you are pretty smart after all..."

"Well, anyone could've figured it out once given the right info, ahahaha." She said with a big head.

"I guess you're not that smart then..." Ikuto said.

"Excuse me?!" Amu exclaimed.

"It's so fun to tease you, you get mad so easily..." Ikuto smirked.

"Grrr"

"You were right about everything you concluded by the way." Ikuto said.

"Really?"

"Yup. I did get that info from Tadase to figure out why I was given this mission and part of the mission is, like you said, getting close to him. And you are right also, by the way, about me having to kidnap him." Ikuto said.

"Really? I wasn't sure if I was right about it, but I guess I was able to conclude correctly then." Amu said.

"But even though you know these things, you can't help me with my mission nor can you tell anyone else about it." Ikuto said.

"What? Why?!" Amu exclaimed.

"Easter's a dangerous company, Amu. They can do whatever they want without fear of punishment. They can just make people disappear if they feel like it and they can take away or kidnap anyone they choose that dares to threaten them." Ikuto said.

"I'm aware of that! I figure that if they're making you do all this stuff, then they're THAT kind of company!" Amu told him.

"If you know that, then you should know that you can't get involved! You can't help me with this mission or my plan and you can't be involved with me anymore!"

"I can't be involved with YOU? Why?" Amu asked curiously.

'Shit! WHy did I say that? I can't tell her that the reason I'm doing this mission is because Kazuomi threatened to do something to her if I didn't obey. I know she'd feel so bad about it if I told her, so I can't let her know.'

"I-It's complicated..." Ikuto said.

"Don't you pull that 'It's complicated' stuff on me! I already know just about everything going on with your mission, so there's no use in hiding anything else!" Amu argued.

"Just please Amu. Let it slide." Ikuto said a bit sadly.

"Fine." she said. 'I can't say no if he's making a face like that...'

"Oh! I have a deal I'd like to make with you." Amu said.

"I don't know if I can make any deals..." Ikuto said.

"Just hear me out!" Amu said. "Let me help you out with your mission, I won't be publicly involved with you, cuz they're watching you aren't they? Also, let me in on your plan against Easter and-"

"I don't think-"

"I'm not done yet!" she cut him off. "And in exchange, I won't tell anyone about any of this and I'll tell you all about the Dumpty Key."

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Yay! Done with the chapter! I liked writing this one :P I hope you guys enjoyed it! I think I'm gonna end this fic soon :( at least 3 more chapters i think... I don't want it to end, but I don't want to stall it just because I don't want it to end. Oh well, I'll just see how things turn out.

Wish me luck guys! It's my exam week this week! That also means I can't update til Friday, but I don't update that often anyways :P

Review, Review, REVIEW! :D


	8. Deal!

"The Dumpty Key? Is that the thing that Easter's after?" Ikuto asked her.

"Yep. That's right!" Amu replied.

"How do you know about it? Isn't it an heirloom of Tadase's family? He doesn't even know about it himself, so how do you know?" Ikuto asked her curiously.

"Tadase's grandmother told me about it before when I was in his house one time." She said.

"Why were you in his house?" Ikuto asked with a little defensiveness.

"Well, I went out with him for a while when I was in 5th grade…" Amu said looking away.

"YOU went out with Tadase?!" Ikuto said in shock. 'Now I hate this kid even more… I wouldn't mind giving him over to Easter, hehehehe.' Ikuto laughed evilly in his head.

"Y-yeah I did." Amu continued to look away as she blushed a light shade of pink. "I myself don't really know why, maybe it was because at the time he seemed so much like royalty and his princely aura was kinda attractive and–and… Wait, why do you care?"

"I-I never said I cared, I was just thinking that he doesn't suit you, that's all" Ikuto said.

"O-Oh ok..." Amu said. 'Sounds like he does care to me... But maybe I'm being egotistic...'

"So, tell me about the Dumpty Key," Ikuto said.

"Well, the Dumpty Key as you know is an heirloom of Tadase's family. It's been passed down for generations through their family but Easter has been trying to get it for a long time. It's like they're at war with each other. Tadase doesn't know much about it, because his parents and grandmother don't want to worry him or burden him with the key."

"That's nice of them, but I think he's gonna have to deal with it soon..." Ikuto said.

"Oh yeah, you're mission right?" Amu said with a bit of sadness.

"Don't worry about it first, continue," Ikuto said.

"Tadase's grandmother said that the key is lucky, but Tadase's parents think it causes nothing but misfortune. It's actually the only thing Tadase's grandmother has left from her grandmother, who she really loved. Tadase's parents don't see the importance of the key or at least his mom doesn't. She wants to just give it over to Easter, because they keep threatening the family about handing over the key. She's just worried for Tadase and his Dad I guess, but Tadase's grandmother wants to keep it, no matter what. She said that when she dies, they can hand it over. It seems like they'll get their wish soon... She seems to be getting sicker, because of all the stress and worry..."

"That's pretty sad... Why does Easter want the key?" Ikuto asked.

"Well, the key is said to have a pair, the Humpty Lock. I think the Humpty Lock which is currently protecting something. I think it might be on a safe or something, but it's said to be protecting something really valuable, something really powerful. I think it grants any wish. I think it's called-"

"The Embryo..." Ikuto said with a spaced look. 'Wow, my mission is more important than I thought it was. This is also really dangerous now... The Embryo, huh? This is the sole reason for Easter's existence. I thought they were on a quest for it, I guess it's just a quest for the way to get to it...'

"Do you think that Easter could already have the lock and everything with them?" Amu asked.

"I don't think so, Kazuomi would probably be overjoyed if he had it, so I don't think so. Do the Dumpty Key and Humpty Lock have a special connection, by any chance?"

"Well now that I think about it... I think that the Dumpty key can sense the Humpty Lock if the holder really wishes for it. They both have a lot to do with the heart..." Amu answered.

"That must be why they're after the key first. Once they have the key, then they've pretty much got the Embryo..." Ikuto voiced.

"That's not good... They're pretty much gonna be getting the key with your mission, right?" Amu asked worriedly.

"Yeah, I guess they are..." Ikuto said. "But I can't let that happen..."

"WE can't let that happen." Amu emphasized and smiled.

"Well, I guess you'll have to be in on it then to keep my end of the bargain..." Ikuto said with a bit of amusement.

"That's right! So, where do we start, then?" Amu asked enthusiastically.

"Well, I have to tell Tsukasa about all this. I am his nephew after all and he's a part of the mission too..."

"So does that mean I'm coming over?" Amu smiled.

"I-I don't know... He gets home pretty late..." Ikuto said. 'Amu at my house? Would be kinda weird if she ended up staying the night, 'cause she probably will since Tsukasa gets home late. Would he even let her stay over? Wait, it's Tsukasa, of course he'll let her stay over...'

"It's okay! It's Friday, my parents are fine with me being out on Fridays. I can come home late if I want to." Amu said.

Ikuto sighed. "Fine, I guess I have to keep up my end of the deal since I'm a gentleman..."

"Hm, a gentleman? I don't know about that..." Amu smirked teasingly.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ikuto smiled.

"Is a gentleman mean to women?" Amu continued teasingly.

"I didn't intend to be mean, it was for your own good..."

"Mhmm, and being a pervert is something any gentleman would do too..." She said sarcastically.

"Only the real ones," Ikuto smirked.

"If you were a gentleman you'd have told me about this, you know."

"You figured it out on your own and if I'm so not a gentleman, then I wouldn't have to keep my end of the deal now would I?" Ikuto said. He got her there.

"Fine. I take it back. Now keep your end of the deal and let's go to your house."

"Ok then, get your things and let's go."

Amu grabbed her things and waited for Ikuto. 'I can't believe I'm going to Ikuto's house... Now my heart's beating like crazy. This'll be fun, I know it.'

"You ready?" Ikuto asked.

"Yup."

"Ok, let's go then," Ikuto began walking out of the greenhouse with Amu beside him.

'Ikuto's house, huh? I wonder what it's like there...'

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I'm so so soooooo sorry I didn't update in sooo long! First I had exams, then school work piled up, then a typhoon hit our country and caused a lot of damage, then school got busy again! I'm so sorry! I'll try to update sooner!!

I hope you liked the chapter!! The next one's gonna be lotsa fun! Ikuto and Amu are gonna be alone in the house, imagine that :" Any suggestions as to what they should do? :"


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